A Web of Fear
by Theophaneia
Summary: Lily Evans has a serious problem and the only thing she can think of doing is talking to James Potter. Her bottled emotions are soon to be released as she approaches James in the middle of the night for help. But how will he react to her secret?


_A/N: Hey, guys! Here's the newly edited version of Releasing Emotions. I changed the title and added bits and bits more to the chapter. Feedback, criticism, and comments are lovely! Enjoy!_

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Lily Evans took one look around her plain, white room. Moving boxes were strewn from where she was standing to the olive green couch at her right. She was simply unpacking when she suddenly realized it, the horror in all its ugliness. Lily glanced at every corner, every tabletop, every piece of furniture in extreme paranoia, her eyes always landing on a specific spot on the wall across her in the end. She needed help, and she saw it.

What was she going to do? She could swear she was going crazy. She had no clue what to do in this situation. Lily knew she couldn't leave it as it was or she would burst with insanity. She had to do something, anything. But what could she do? She couldn't act alone. No, she was too scared for that. Lily needed help, and she knew, herself, whom she'd have to resort to in the end.

She paced back and forth on her red and golden rug, which she had bought in honor of being the brave Gryffindor she was. Looking down on it, Lily could hardly believe herself. Brave, was she? Then what was she doing that very second? To her, it seemed a bit like the monster called "excessive fear" was controlling her.

However, despite all she tried to do to shake off all her doubts and feelings, she couldn't. She could not let go of this specific fear. Through everything she had gone through as a teenager, she did not want to accept the fact that this tiny issue affected her so much. But it did, and still, Lily didn't know what to do. Every other problem around her seemed miniscule, unimportant almost. She had no clue as to how she could solve her problem.

She couldn't explain, nor could she deny, how she felt; to her, it was all too horrible to describe. Her feelings were consuming her and she had to act fast. With one last glance at the wall in front of her, Lily Evans disapparated.

James Potter awoke with a start, groaning at the fact that it was still dark out and that he would still be sleeping, had he not been disturbed by a loud, resonating crack that sounded to his left. He stiffened, expecting nothing less than an attack. For the past couple of years, his growing concern for his safety, and for the safety of those he cared about, forced him to hide his wand, weapon and protector, beneath his pillow as he slept. It was circumstances such as the present that made him truly appreciate his caution for unwelcome attacks.

However, as he stuffed his hand underneath his pillow, grabbing his wand just in case, he looked to his side and recognized the frightened face of his once schoolmate. He looked groggily into the eyes of none other than Lily Evans.

"Whaa—Lily? What are you…? How did you…? Why are you here? What's wrong? Did something happen?" James took a glance around the room, half assuming to find more people jump out at him in fright, just as Lily had.

"Er, yeah. James? I need you to come with me," Lily replied, nervously. She looked a right mess, especially considering her delicate and usually coordinated hands were twitching. James knew something was seriously off beat for her to come to him being in the condition she was currently in. "I'm sorry for waking you, but I really need your help. Please, James."

All it took for James to follow Lily obligingly was one look at her anxious face and trembling body. He stood out of bed and next to Lily for side-along apparition. He supposed she'd be taking him to where she previously came from just seconds ago. With a crack, they had both left.

After a horribly suffocating feeling on James' part, both Lily and he landed in a room slightly larger than the one they had disapparated from. James took a look around the room, his eyes landing lastly on Lily.

"What's up, Lily? What's so important that you had to wake me up in the bloody middle of the night?" James was evidently still adjusting to being awake and was a bit irritable at that, but Lily ignored that image in her haste to explain things to him.

"James. Look at that," Lily pleaded, pointing her finger straight across from her. After receiving a strange look from James, she added, "Please, just do it."

If someone were to enter the room at that exact moment, they would find a young woman and a man both staring at an empty, white wall for much longer than just a second. That was it; two normal adults staring at a clear, vacant wall, seemingly having nothing better to do than just that.

Of course, they wouldn't be able to hear the thoughts that were swimmingly freely in both heads. They wouldn't know the nervous, scared emotions roaming through the lady's or the confused, sleepy ones inhabiting the man's. They would just see two people gazing blankly at a white wall.

"Lily, what's wrong with it?"

"What's wrong with it? What's _wrong_ with it? James, do you not see what's on that wall?"

For a moment, James stared pointedly at her, trying to get through to her that she had nothing to worry about. Before he could get put his say in the conversation, Lily continued.

"Okay fine. I know. It's stupid of me, but I can't help the way I feel. I'm scared and I'm trying to ignore these feelings, but it isn't possible! It just isn't! I can try to go to sleep and I can try to move on to tomorrow, but I can't when I know that it's going to be there forever unless I do something about it! James, can you please, please, please just understand?"

Lily eyes were huge and desperate at this point, wishing full out that James would just cooperate with her. It would be a whole lot more trouble-free and she and James would be able to go back to bed quicker. Separately, of course.

It was then that James burst out laughing with full force. He couldn't believe the situation at hand. It was so ironic, so paradoxical.

Lily gaped at him with a confused and affronted look. "James! Stop laughing! This is completely serious. _I'm_ serious! I can't believe you're laughing about me!"

"No, no, no, Lily," he said with big, humor-filled eyes. "It's just that I would never think this could happen, of all people. You, a nineteen-year old previously-Gryffindor witch, who has faced much worse than any Muggle could possibly imagine, is afraid of _that_?"

"Yeah, you're not helping yourself," Lily stated, fake-glaring at her boyfriend of two years. "Just kill the stupid thing before I kill you instead!"

See, what you don't understand is that if someone were to walk in at the previous moment and find two young adults peering at a seemingly bare wall, they would have overlooked the hideously disgusting, tiny, almost obscured spider that called Lily's wall its home. Lily's _problem_ wasn't a problem, per se. It was a phobia.


End file.
